The Environmental Motor Company Making Detroit a subsidiary of the Sierra Club.

When is $25 billion in taxpayer cash insufficient to bail out Detroit's auto makers? Answer:

When the money is a tool of Congressional industrial policy to turn GM, Ford and Chrysler into agents of the Sierra Club and other green lobbies. AP Ford CEO Alan Mulally, Chrysler CEO Robert Nardelli, and GM CEO Rick Wagoner at a Senate hearing on the state of the auto industry That's the little-understood subplot of the Washington melodrama over a taxpayer rescue for Detroit.

In their public statements, proponents describe the bailout as an attempt to save jobs, American manufacturing and the middle-class way of life. But look closely and you can see that what's really going on is an attempt to use taxpayer money to remake Detroit in the image of the modern environmental movement.

Given a choice between greens and blue-collar workers, Congress puts the greens first.

SALISBURY — Mayor Barrie Parsons Tilghman may sign a climate agreement modeled after the Kyoto Protocol based on a positive recommendation recently made by the Environmental Policy Task Force.

When Tilghman was approached by members of the Lower Shore chapter of the Maryland Sierra Club to sign the U.S. Mayors Climate Protection agreement, she forwarded the request to the task force before making a decision.

“We’re just excited she is moving forward in considering this agreement,” said Sharon Spinak, a Salisbury Sierra Club member.

Tilghman said she met with City Administrator John Pick on Tuesday to discuss the agreement and plans to support it so long as it does not obligate the city to take action, in which case the City Council would need to be involved in passing the agreement.

The agreement, part of the Sierra Club’s Cool Cities program, was created by Seattle Mayor Greg Nichols in 2005 to promote the goals of the Kyoto Protocol — an international agreement signed by more than 100 countries, excluding the U.S., to work toward reducing greenhouse gas emissions that cause climate change — on a local level. More than 500 cities have signed onto the Mayor’s Climate Protection agreement, including 11 in Maryland.

The agreement asks cities to commit to meeting or beating Kyoto Protocol targets through actions ranging from anti-sprawl land-use policies to urban forest restoration projects as well as urge politicians, state and federal agencies to reduce global warming pollution levels and pass bipartisan greenhouse gas reduction legislation.

Dave Nemazie, chair of the Environmental Policy Task Force, told the mayor a vast majority of the task force endorsed the agreement during their October meeting, while one member was concerned by the city’s encouragement of the Kyoto Protocol nationally for economic reasons. Nemazie said that same member fully supported the mayor in striving to implement the changes locally, regardless.

The implementation of the agreement could mean greater attention given to large and small scale environmental issues in the city, from switching to LED bulbs in traffic lights to creating a widespread plan to cleanup local waterways.

The task force met this week to discuss recommendations Nemazie said will be forwarded to the mayor by February regarding the direction of the city’s environmental policy. Nemazie said they are still in the preliminary drafting stages.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.